


Here with me

by seenonlyfromadistance



Category: Les Misérables (movie verse whoa)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-15
Updated: 2013-01-15
Packaged: 2017-11-27 02:08:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/656895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seenonlyfromadistance/pseuds/seenonlyfromadistance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The barricade has fallen, the end is near, and Enjolras, the symbol and the man, is alone... until he's not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here with me

**Author's Note:**

> this is like... an extended _Orestes Fasting and Pylades Drunk_ based off how things go down in the movie.

  
The barricade is falling. Enjolras finds himself flat on his back on the pavement, having been knocked down by a close splash of cannon fire. For a moment, all he sees is the sky above him, like any other day. The air around him is quiet, or maybe his ears are ringing. Then a shower of splinters and debris rains down on his face, and he remembers where he is. Someone grabs at his shoulders and sleeve, pulling him up. Scrambling to his feet, he sees his friends back by the cafe. He beats a hasty retreat to join them, scampering backwards to keep an eye on the approaching soldiers. He reaches behind him, expecting to be handed a rifle or pistol, and finds something soft in his hand instead. It's someone elses hand, pressed into his grasp. He turns; it's Grantaire. Grantaire, awake and alert like he hasn't been in years, looking scared and desperate. There's no time to say anything, no time at all, so Enjolras merely takes a firm hold on Grantaire's hand and together they run into the cafe, closing and bracing the door behind them.

The air inside smells like fear and gunpowder, mud and death and shit. Combeferre waves them towards the back, indicating that they should go upstairs. Courfeyrac is there too, and Joly, but that's all. It's just the five of them. Enjolras has a moment of shock and confusion separate from the chaos all around him. His friends have fallen and he hardly even noticed. It all happened too fast.

All this death, all this wasted youth--

But there's no time to think those thoughts. Grantaire still has not let his hand go, and he gives him a squeeze and a tug.

"Come on!" Courfeyrac calls, his voice cracking, and Enjolras runs to join him. Arm in arm, all tangled up in each other, they run up the stairs just as the national guard burst through the front door. They half break up the stairs before there are too many guardsmen in the cafe to safely remain near the ground floor and they clamber up through the stairwell, half climbing half stepping. For a moment, the broken stairs slow the guard. From the top of the stairs they start to throw whatever they can find at the guardsmen below, bottles and cups and debris. Eventually they come together, tangling again as they run out of projectiles. His arm is wrapped around Courfeyrac's back, his fingertips brushing Combeferre's on the other side. Fear slides off them and pools at their feet as they step away from the stairwell, waiting for the attack to come. They are brave young men, but all men fear the end of life. Enjolras looks around and notices Grantaire is not with them. In the confusion of getting up the stairs, he had lost hold of Grantaire's hand.

There is too much gunfire in the air to know what has happened. He could have been shot, or he could have just as easily escapsed. More likely than not, Grantaire is dead on the floor below them.

"Where's Grantaire?" Enjolras asks quickly, "did they get him?"

Before anyone can answer, there is gunfire from downstairs and Combeferre, Joly and Courfeyrac fall with a cry, sliced from below. More startled than anything else, Enjolras's initial impulse is to follow them down, his knees buckling and his hands reaching for them. But when his mind finally catches up with what has happened, he leaps back and away, gasping, driven towards the far side of the room as tears rush to his eyes. There is blood on his boots. He half sees Combeferre writhing, his closest friend in the world lying in a growing pool of his own blood, then falling still. Enjolras staggers against the window. It's all too surreal and unbelievable, that it's come to this. Even though he always knew their revolution was likely to fail, it stills hurts him to face the fact that it has. It hurts him to see his friends lying there; it makes him sick and frightened.

Not once before in his life has he felt frightened in the face of the revolution, but now he is alone.

The national guard are clambering up through the whole in the floor; He throws his pistol at them. His chest is so tight with grief that it hurts to breathe, but Enjolras fights through it, knowing he cannot succumb now in what are likely to be his last moments.

He's hardly twenty-five, and he is facing his last moments.

He rushes towards the very front of the cafe, far away from the stairs and backed up against the window. He grabs the flag on his way, clutching it tightly. It feels like security and he knows he needs to be strong now more than ever.

The National Guard has surrounded him, their rifles all aimed in his direction. He is the last of the rebels, he can see them thinking. Their eyes shine with the gloating pride of victory. The leader of the guardsmen is a man hardly older than Enjolras himself. He has a perfectly kept mustache and stands straight and tall.

"Hold!" The leader calls when he spots Enjolras by the window. There is something angelic about the young man before him, his golden hair glowing around him in the sunlight, his proud face and strong stance. "Will you surrender?"

Enjolras backs further against the window, clutching the flag tighter in his hand. "No."

"And you are the leader of this band of fools, are you not?"

Hesitant to answer, for he has never felt like _the_ leader, merely one of many, Enjolras takes a deep breath.

"Well?" The officer demands. His comrades are starting to appear impatient. They are ready to shoot the last of these insurgents and go home.

He is the only one left; "Yes, I am." He lifts his chin proudly, though his heart is in his throat. He will die as bravely as he can.

"So be it," The leader of the guard says sadly, as if a different answer might have changed Enjolras' fate. It wouldn't of course, because Enjolras is a traitor to the state, and traitors cannot be allowed to live. He gestures for the men to ready their rifles.

Enjolras merely wishes he wasn't alone.

The guns are cocked and aimed at his chest.

At that exact moment, a voice floats up from downstairs.

"Wait! Wait for me!"

The voice belongs to Grantaire, and Enjolras' heart drops into his stomach. His wish has been fulfilled, and now he won't be alone in death... but he doesn't want this either.

Grantaire had slid under the stairwell as the front door came down. His friends had run upstairs, cracking the stairs behind them, leaving the climb to the second floor treacherous and difficult. Grantaire tried to call out to them, but they didn't hear him. So he remained hidden as the guard poured in. Part of him knew that he might be safe if he stayed exactly where he was, tucked away and out of sight. But then he heard the shots go up through the floor, heard the bodies fall. His heart jumped at that, a terror he had not quite known before. Perhaps it was Enjolras lying up above, his breast pierced by bullets, his blood spilling out of him. Perhaps his last memory of Enjolras living would be one of fear as they ran from certain death, as he realized his grip had slipped and Enjolras was climbing the stairs without him. The thought of it hurt him physically, that his last sight of Enjolras might be the man's back. Or that he would wait until the guard cleared out, and then climb upstairs to take a last look at a corpse.

No.

He hears footsteps scuttling above him, a few scattered gunshots. Someone is still alive up there. And then he hears the voice-- the clear voice of Enjolras. _So he does still live_ , Grantaire thinks, and without further consideration he crawls out of his hiding place and begins to haul himself up the broken stairs.

He will not be left to die on his own, a coward and a failure. He will not be left behind.

It's tough goings, and the first thing he sees at the top of the stairs is six pairs of boots and Courfeyrac's face beyond that. It is and it is not Courfeyrac-- it is his features, but limp and empty, lying in a pool of blood and dirt. With a little effort, and with the change of angle as he begins to climb, the crumpled bodies of Combeferre and Joly become visible as well, each of them broken and still.

When he hears the clack of rifles being lifted, he says something.

"Not yet! Wait! _Vive la Republique_! Wait for me!" He steps up the final stair, and pushes his way through the national guard. "I'm with him." They all look at him as if he's mad, and probably he is. But he does not return their looks of incredulity-- all he can see is Enjolras. His golden idol stands before him more magnificent than ever, haloed from behind by the early morning sunlight.

When Enjolras spots him, coming up from below, his eyes tired, he wishes that Grantaire had just stayed wherever he had been. Or not come to the barricade at all. Or never arrived at the Cafe Musain looking for drinks and company. He nearly wishes that they had never met, so that this moment would not have to occur.

Grantaire genuinely has to shove his way past the soliders to reach Enjolras, but he does. The only thing he has ever cared for is about to die, and he knows that he must die by his side.

"What are you doing?" His Apollo hisses, his dignity cracking for just a moment. "Get out of here."

"I won't let you go alone," he says, moving to take his place. He is tempted to position himself in front of Enjolras, to try and protect him, save someone much more worthwhile than himself, but he knows that _that_ Enjolras would not allow. So he places himself just as his side. " If I may die at your feet, it would be my distinct honor. If you'll allow it, of course."

Enjolras hesitates, his heart crushed. His gaze flickers to his dead friends on the floor and then back to Grantaire; "I will not. I will not allow it. Leave, Grantaire, please." He turns to the soldiers before him; "This man is drunk and lost. He is not a revolutionary."

"I am!" Grantaire protests, planting his feet firmly. He turns to Enjolras with a fire in his eyes which is unfamiliar, yet bright and beautiful. "I insist. Please, Enjolras. You must permit me this one indulgence."

Enjolras smiles weakly, giving in. There's no point in fighting any more. The fight is over. He has lost, just like he lost his fight for the people of France.

"You may die at my side." With the hand not still grasping the flag, he reaches out to take Grantaire's hand in his own. "For we are equals."

"No, not at all." The national guard are starting to get restless, but their leader is a good man-- he will allow these boys their final moments, let them face their inescapable death when they are ready. "I love you, you know. Truly."

"I know." He stumbles over what to say next, knowing their time is limited. "I'm glad you're here with me."

"I have never wanted to be anywhere else."

"Thank you." Enjolras gives another weak, crooked smile and give Grantaire's hand a squeeze;

"Good-bye."

"Good-bye, Apollo."

They look out to the national guard, Enjolras with his head held high and chest proudly presented, his eyes wet and sad, Grantaire slouched but with a brave look in his eyes.

At least they are together.

" _Vive la France_!" Enjolras cries, lifting the flag high.

There is an explosion, a flash of pain, the sound of shattering glass. Grantaire feels Enjolras' hand be ripped from his, feels his own back hit the wall and then it's over. Enjolras feels nothing, for he is dead before his back hits the window, before he crashes out onto the roof, before the flag slips from his hand and from under his back and falls onto the street.

It lies there, coated in mud and the blood of a dozen young men, until the clean up is done.

The national guard pull Enjolras' body in almost immediately, stepping over Grantaire to reach him. They are not stupid; they cannot let his body remain as it is, let the image of it, trailing his flag and his ideals, his beautiful young face spattered in his own blood, be seared into the minds of the people. They know if they leave this sight for too long, there will be sketches and paintings in no time-- the spirit of the revolution exemplified and romanticised in the final image of this poor boy.

Two of them reach through the broken window, grab at his jacket, and pull him back inside. From below, on the street, Inspector Javert looks up. There is still blood at his hairline, and his face is hard as he watches them manhandle the corpse of this young man. _By God_ , he thinks, _how young he was, no more than a child_. Javert touches the still aching gash on his scalp, reminding himself that it was that young man in particular, that red-coated hero of the people, who bashed him so brutally and half hung him from a noose. He must remind himself of the violence these boys created and brought back upon their own heads.

_No,_ Javert thinks, _there is nothing heroic in their deaths, nothing beautiful or pure. They were merely stupid, foolish schoolboys, and now they are dead._

Enjolras disappears back into the cafe, where the guardsmen lay him out beside the bodies of his friends. Each of them look small and young and not at all at peace. Eventually they will have to be identified and sent home, but for now they may rest together.

And yet, despite the greatest efforts of the government, the image of Enjolras lives on. The years go by and he is remembered less and less as a man and more as a physical embodiment of the revolution, struck down by the injustice of humanity. He becomes a symbol. And so does Grantaire, as the man who loved the revolution. Their final stand together, both more willing to die than to surrender, becomes a rallying point for future revolutionary souls.

Their insurrection acheived nothing, but their deaths acheived everything. They become the subject of pamphlets, articles-- the much feared sketches and paintings. The fire of freedom continues to burn in part because of Marius Pontmercy and his lovely wife. Together they keep the memories of his friends alive, along with the magical ideal of the revolution which remains constantly brewing under the surface of Paris. Yet the idea of Enjolras and Grantaire remain in the public's mind in no small way because of the men who killed them, who cannot help but talk about it. They go back to their lives after cleaning up the mess of the barricades, and speak of the way the young men glowed in each others company, infused each other with strength, the tenderness and affection they showed each other. How they were brave in the face of death, yet sad to be leaving life. Not arrogant, not proud, not foolish, but merely resigned to something they had perhaps always known-- that they would die young and die together.


End file.
